Protein methylation is one of the important post-translational modifications. Although its
biological and physiological functions were unknown for a long time, we and others have characterized a number of
protein methyltransferases, which have unveiled the critical functions of
protein methylation in various cellular processes, in particular, in epigenetic regulation. In addition, it had been believed that
protein methylation is an irreversible phenomenon, but through identification of a variety of
protein demethylases,
protein methylation is now considered to be dynamically regulated similar to
protein phosphorylation. A large amount of evidence indicated that
protein methylation has a pivotal role in post-translational modification of
histone proteins as well as non-
histone proteins and is involved in various processes of
cancer development and progression. As dysregulation of this modification has been observed frequently in various types of
cancer, small-molecule inhibitors targeting
protein methyltransferases and demethylases have been actively developed as anticancer drugs; clinical trials for some of these drugs have already begun. In this review, we discuss the
biological and physiological importance of
protein methylation in human
cancer, especially focusing on the significance of
protein methyltransferases as emerging targets for anticancer
therapy.